If you liked Miss Austen then I thoroughly recommend this book.
This book centres around Edward Knight and his family and focuses on Fanny Knight and Mary Knatchbull. Based on true events, it's fascinating how woman were treated, how their lives were mapped out for them by their father's and just how many children they all had!
I love that Cassandra Austen still features heavily in their lives.

I was delighted to receive an ARC of Gill Hornby’s latest book which tells more about the Austen family and again involves Cassandra Austen.
It continues the story of Fanny Knight which started in Godmersham Park and tells of her marriage to Sir Edward Knatchbull and her relationship with Edward’s daughter,Mary Dorothea.
Mary becomes involved with the Knight family as a result of being Fanny’s stepdaughter ,and the story is told from both of their points of view.When Mary falls in love with Fanny’s brother Ned ,things become complicated,(without giving away too much of the plot).
The book is written in the style of Jane Austen and is both humorous and poignant .It really emphasises the way women were treated as their fathers’ possessions ,with little say in what happened to them.
I enjoyed the book very much and was sorry when it ended.Definitely one to recommend to Jane Austen fans.

A charming read bringing the Austen family and their descendants to life. I do admit there are parts in the first half that seem to slow the pace of the story but the second half more than makes up for it. Enjoyable and moreish. A lovely read.

Thank you Netgalley

Having really enjoyed Gill Hornby’s other Jane Austen related novels I was delighted to be given the opportunity to read and review ‘The Elopement’. I was soon immersed in the world of the Austen Knights and their very large extended family.
The author gives several characters a voice meaning that we, as readers, can see the narrative develop from different points of view. This makes the story so much more well rounded than just one characters perspective and gives an insight into everyday life for a family like the Knights and the expectations that society had for them and how some still managed to defy them.
It also gives us a chance to catch up with Cassandra Austen, still a fierce champion of her sister, Jane, and see her continuing importance as she takes her place in the families of her nieces and nephews.
I very much enjoyed The Elopement and would recommend it without hesitation.

Rooted in the histories of Austen's relations, this book brings a whole cast of characters to life. Between them they are warm, funny, frustrating and at times ridiculous, but all very human.

I picked this book up expecting the whirlwind romance of the elopement to take centre stage, but the story covers so much more. Taking place over the span of nearly twenty years, there are plenty of personal dramas along the way to keep it entertaining (the elopement is also very much a romantic whirlwind, never fear).

I loved getting to explore all the different relationships and dynamics over time, and was just as invested in Mary 's relationship with her new stepmother Fanny, and the challenges they faced, as I was in the romance with Ned.

Gill Hornby once again welcomes us into the rich and complex history of the Austen family. This time we meet her niece, Fanny, as a grown woman and follow her as she navigates being a wife and mother and leaving behind her beloved family with her loyalties split.

I enjoyed the added perspective of her step daughter, Mary, and the slow and steady unfolding of her relationship. I found the book enjoyable with flawed and real characters. Another great blend of history and imagination

A must for any Jane Austen fan. This is an utterly charming book based on the family of Jane's brother Edward, written in what can only be described as an Austenesque style. He arranges for his eldest daughter to marry a local widower with a young family. This is her role - to be a wife, a mother, to run a household, and defer, at all times to her husband. She attempts to form a relationship with his only daughter, but not as successfully as she would hope. Both families, living closely to each other, socialise in ways familiar to any reader of Austen's novel - balls, dinners, trips to London, relationships are formed, hopes are dashed.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this, and would recommend it to anyone.

With thanks to NetGalley and Penguin for an ARC.

Oh Hurrah, Gill Hornby is back with another Austen Adjacent novel. I could not have been happier to delve into the lives of those families that Gravitated around and just after the life of the ever present Jane. Yet again the lessons and themes of her glorious novels affect and transform lives even posthumously.

However I am getting ahead of myself, This is at it’s core the tale of two Orphans whose formative years are so similar and yet characters diverge. So drastically.. Fanny Knight, Daughter of Jane’s brother James and Mary Dorothea Knatchbull who becomes (through a marriage of sensible decision rather than great passion) her Step-Daughter.

It was a simple plot but woven through with a complexity of inner voices that showed just how wide and varied the human condition and experience can truly be..

I understood Fanny and her convictions, but I did not much warm to her. She was capable of loves and honour but seemed unable to form an independent thought outside the confines of what she saw as her responsibility to the men in her life. Gill Hornby paints her so clearly. If we were comparing -perhaps a combination of poor Mary Bennett and Charlotte Lucas. I felt oddly sorry for her as she alone could have been the catalyst for good in a lot of the failed romance in the book.

Mary Dorothea on the other hand was much more sympathetic and again, a full and rounded version of her sprang off the page. I was rooting for her and her relationship from the very first and was profoundly moved by her story. I love the numerous siblings who float in and out but it is the Aunts in this book that truly deserve praise. Adored them both.

A truly lovable rogue and gentleman is the romantic lead, who frankly I have a bit of a crush on too now. That this and other romances truly existed ( even gussied up with artistic license) fills my little soft heart.!

This book is so much more a companion to Jane’s great novels (As Miss Austen was before) than so many of the prequels, homages and reimagining that have been published. You feel that Pemberley, Netherfield and Mansfield could exist in harmony with Godmersham and Hatch!

I devoured this book after a reading slump and it gave me so much joy and has galvanised a return to certain of Jane’s…. In this case Persuasian.. Read The Elopement and find out why!! Gill Hornby is a expert at imagining personality and inner voices for people that exist often as side characters in the journals of others. She creates real people who mean much to a reader. I loved this book. And look forward to any other family history that Gill Hornby may feel impelled to pen.

Just my sort of read. The period of Jane Austen. This novel tells the tale of some relatives of Jane Austen, just after her death. It was based on the journals of a niece of Jane Austen, with some artistic license as the gaps had to be filled in. How difficult it was for ladies of the “aristocracy” when it came to marriage. It makes one appreciate how times have changed for the better when it comes to choosing a partner. The times were well described and I could imagine the countryside and homes they lived in. Escapism really as this style of life was certainly not what most of the population had to deal with at the time. Great character descriptions and a love stories for many of the couples/ladies.

What an enjoyable read. I loved every minute of it and was so sorry when I reached the end. Gill Hornby gives a brilliant depiction of the world of Jane Austen.- in fact it was like stepping into a new Jane Austen novel, except the characters were not fictional. I knew very little about Jane Austen's extended family when I started reading this book. - how the widowed Sir Edward Knatchbull, a man of strict principles, marries Miss Fanny Knight of Godmerscham Park,. Through this arrangement, his only daughter Mary Dorothea Knatchbull is consequently drawn into Fanny's larger family circle, of several brothers and sisters, as well as her aunt MIss Cassandra Austen of Chawton, the sister of the late Jane Austen. Mary's life, which until then has been quite lonely and joyless, starts to blossom. Fanny's brothers are handsome, full of life and charming and Mary starts to form a special bond with the eldest Ned Knight in particular. Marriage would appear to be on the horizon, given how much the couple are in love and each from a good family, however would that it were that simple ...............

Gill's eye for period detail, the language of the time, the wit, grace and elegance of style is wonderful. The way her characters are so sharply observed, as well as the plot developments, could be straight out of novels from Jane Austen herself.

I would definitely recommend this very enjoyable read.

This is a compelling page turner of a book. Using different perspectives the reader is drawn in to the small world of Jane Austen’s family. It’s very vividly depicted and the characters are three dimensional.

Based on the real-life diaries of Fanny, Gill Hornby has managed to bring the whole cast vividly to life, along with their opinions and characteristics.

It’s very enjoyable and even though I do not normally read historical fiction, this is the exception to the rule. Well worth the time taken to read, to be immersed in a different world and time, led by an expert.

I think if you are a big fan of Jane Austen and want to read around her life (and family's life) then the books by Gill Hornby are possibly interesting. I read "Godmersham Park" a while back and that had some good links to Jane Austen but in "The Elopement" a lot of time has passed and she is no longer around. Based on the memoirs of Fanny (maybe a niece) this was far too tenuous and far too long for me. Bits were interesting but I just felt it went on and on and on. Think that's me done for the Jane Austen family dynasty for the moment.

This was brilliantly written and very detailed- you can only imagine the hours and hours of research that have gone into it. Fanny was a strange character- I sometimes felt sorry for her, she often exasperated me and generally I think she let down all the step children she “took on”. Mary was a great character- immensely likeable and I really felt sorry for her and her total inability to ever please Sir Edward and the mother. Fab book, really enjoyed it.

I found this book quite hard to get into and the characters were quite unlikeable. Half way through and it became much more interesting and faster paced. I love to read Austen but this book wasn't of the same ilk. Interesting though that it was based on the memoirs of one of the main character, Fanny.

The Elopement is a very well-researched story based on the dairies of Fanny Knight, Jane Austen's niece. There are a lot of characters so 'A Note About Names' and 'The Families' at the beginning of the book were very useful. The Author's Note at the end gives further historical background. I loved this book. It is so well-written with vivid period detail that I felt immersed in the Austen world and did not want it to end. It inspired me to read Gill Hornby's other novels about the Austen family.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an arc in exchange for an honest review.

This was a tiny bit boring. There, I said it.
Once you wade through the first half, you are rewarded with a good story in the second. I could not even decide who the main character was up until some 60% of the book. Events were centred around Fanny as much as around Mary, and neither of them seemed like a person capable of passionate feelings.
Jane Austen fans will most probably enjoy this spin off but they should not expect the same wit and character development.

As a long-standing Jane-ite I loved every minute of this novel, the sequel to ‘Miss Austen’, which I also much enjoyed. Written in the style of Jane Austen, Gill Hornby, with wit and grace, immerses us in the lives and sensibilities of her characters and the period atmosphere. Even though I studied the original novels, I knew little about Jane’s extended family, so it was with delight that I learnt so much about their (albeit often imagined) lives. I was hooked from the first page and was sorry when the journey was over.

I have read Miss Austen by the same author and so was interested to read this novel. I knew very little about the Austen family so it was fascinating to read more about the family’s fortunes. The lack of a voice as a woman was particularly well described and seems unbelievable to a modern reader.

The Knight and Knatchbull families are drawn together after the marriage of Fanny - the eldest daughter - to Sir Edward - a widower. Mary - his eldest daughter - finds herself with a step-mother and a new family. She finds herself with friends and allies and eventually finds love with Ned Knight.

However the acceptance they expected did not materialise and costly decisions have to be made which have huge repercussions across both families.

An interesting read. Sad but hopeful as well.

I enjoyed this book very much.

There is a massive thing about Jane Austen at the moment, everyone seems to be talking her and her life and this story is telling the story of her niece who has married a wealthywidow with five children.

Fanny is expected to step up, as it were, and she forms a bond with Mary, the only girl of the brood.

This is a good novel., I just adore Historical fiction and this book gave an insight of how women were expected to behave and how men were definitely 'in charge' ..

It seems well researched and is fabulously told.

DNF @ 50%. I am SO disappointed.

Gill Hornby, step AWAY from the Italics key! It is driving me insane! It turns every line of dialogue into a condescending, sneering jibe that your character development does not warrant in the slightest, there has to be a better way.

'The Elopement' was one of my most anticipated books of 2025, having read both 'Miss Austen' and 'Godmersham Park' over the last few months. And there were things about those novels that irked me, but the plotting and writing was strong enough to keep me going through to the end. The same cannot be said for the third installment in the series. You know you're in trouble when the plot described in the synopsis hasn't even started by the mid-way point. Yes. The mid-way point. 200 pages of SET UP. 200 pages of ignoring any deep emotional thoughts, characters so clumsily re-drawn from real life that they blend into one big blob (with the exception of a few) and action so banal, so repetitive that I had to check the file hadn't corrupted and I was missing something. It's a poorly paced book that doesn't live up to the stakes promised on the dust jacket. It feels like the author did so much research and immersed herself so much that she got completely lost within it - and not in a good way.

The biggest crime that this novel has going for it is it's just dull. I can handle vignettes of everyday life, I've read Hornby's other historical books, but reading this felt like wading through golden syrup. The same characters never changed, they had the same thoughts that were never explored or explained. Conflict is brought up, glanced at, and then dealt with off-page, leaving us to hear the droning inner monologues of the lead female characters (all of which were far too Jesus-y for my tastes). The author was just rambling along, never quite knowing when to start the story, jumping forward in time to give us next to nothing in terms of plot or character development. Nothing happened in the first half, so I have no desire to continue into the 2nd half. That's writing 101.